Have Faith – God Has Plans for
Each One of Us
Some incidents which happen in your life makes
your belief in God only stronger. One such incident happened recently in the
Dec last year when, I along with few of
my office colleagues were on our way to attend another one of our colleague’s wedding
in Rajampet, AP.
So we
decided to head towards our destination via visiting a few temples in between –
Kanipakkam and Kalahasti
We left
Bangalore around 8:30-9 am towards Kanipakkam, which is a famous Ganesha temple
in Chitoor district .We reached the temple around lunch time. Had a very nice
darshan, not much crowd so were able to see the idol for a longer time without
being pushed around. We had lunch and proceeded towards Kalahasti which is a
famous Shiva temple and is said to be the site where Kannappa was ready to offer both his eyes to cover
blood flowing from the linga before Shiva stopped him and granted him moksha.
The
distance from Kanipakam to Kalahasti was around 3 hours approx. and we decided
to take the bypass route as per the google and hoping to finish the darshan and
reach the destination by 7:30 pm. But as fate had destined, the deviation we
took us to a secluded stretch of road with hardly any people but more of cattle
/ strays on the way. We thought since there is no traffic hence will be able to
reach the temple in time.
Seeing the
animals we started joking among ourselves saying the road must have been built
only for the animals. This stretch took us further in the jungles and uphill.
We did meet a couple of local travelers in between who advised us not to go
further as the road are blocked. But since we were in a hurry to reach the
temple and the road look alright to us, we ignored and kept going further. Around
5:30 pm we realized , when another local person said the same thing, we realized
no point in going further and no way we could reach the temple on time and even
if we did reach, then we would be very late for the reception . With a heavy
heart we turned back and proceeded towards our destination. We took another
detour as the locals advised which will take us to Rajampet. By 4 pm only it
was getting dark as during Dec, this time, there had been spells of heavy rain
in between and by 5:50 it was completely dark. . The detour took us through
isolated road which lead to jungles and uphill. We were a little unsure now and
only when we saw a couple of headlights in between heaved a sigh of relief.
The rain
did not stop. Finally we reached downhill and still driving. We did see a
couple of shops in between but they were closing and they guided us to take a
deviation further. Since it was raining and dark, we drove slowly and then in
front we suddenly saw a herd of buffaloes blocking our way and looking at us. And
we said oh god! Not animals again!!! It
was then the buffaloes started giving us way and we started slowing going
further and then the headlights of the car showed the road ahead which was
completed flooded with water and water gushing out. It was then we saw the
warning sign that was put up in a cloth hanging by the side.
We applied
breaks suddenly and I completely panicked and told by colleague to turn back. With
difficulty he did a U-Turn in that small stretch of road with bushes on both
sides, completely dark, raining and not knowing what is on the other side of
the bushes.
That
incident made all of us realize that somehow those animals that we kept on
seeing on the roads must have been some kind of a message that God was sending
for us to be careful. Also it was God
that made us turn back at the right time around 5:30 pm so that we could go back.
Had it been later, we would not have met any people out there on the lonely stretch
of road and could have been stuck in the flooded road. It was those buffaloes
which saved us.
And it made
us realize that God has plans for us. We thanked God and turned back and this
time we were able to reach the highway in the next hour from the detour and
reached the destination on time to attend the reception.
